Originally published in the Cheboygan Daily Tribune...
This winter, we experienced shopping for a car for our teenager--The Millennial--and it's a bit like trying to find a date online. Everything sounds like a dream come true! But it ends up being a guy who photoshopped in teeth and when he wrote 'fully employed' he meant employed in locating online contenders for Dungeons and Dragons.
Now believe me, I don’t think every teenager needs his/her own car. Certainly not in my house. Certainly not today’s “what are you gonna give me?” millennials. In fact, we were firmly NOT getting the teenager a car. But, then, she threw us for a loop. Next year, she’s going to take--get this--college courses off campus for the majority of her senior year. So, she has to drive to Cheboygan, Petoskey, or Gaylord. Every day. For school. For college credit while she’s still in high school. That’s a pretty good argument for getting your own car. So we made an agreement that she would pay the insurance, we would buy the car.
Yes, I have seen the vehicles her classmates drive. I have also seen the jeans they wear and the iPhones they have and the way they toss money around like it’s from a Monopoly game. My husband and I are proud members of the “Well Soandso doesn’t live in our house” club, and none of this affects me. So, I was looking for an inexpensive car. That doesn’t sound bad, does it?
Here were the problems. One-I’m cheap. Like, majorly, seriously, still-have-the-same-socks- I-bought-in-college cheap. So, I wasn’t willing to shuck out thousands and thousands of dollars for my little Barbie Doll to drive around town and wave at her friends.
Problem two-our road. We live in a wonderful, wooded, dead-end road neighborhood in an obscure area of Indian River. We have a 45-60 degree angle driveway. And, well, there’s a LOT of snow here. I got stuck in our driveway with our old Dodge Caravan multiple times, as well as on the road from our house to the main road in Indian River. PLUS, the Millennial wants to go to college at Michigan Tech (I know, that IS awesome). So, she needed four wheel or all wheel drive. That, my friends, is not cheap.
Problem three-the Millennial is a putz. She didn’t want to get a license any more than we wanted to get her a car, so she dragged her feet long enough that she couldn’t even take the test until February. So, as I started looking at vehicles in August, my hubby complained that it would “just sit in our driveway and rust”. Even if I found something decent, the hubby wanted to wait.
Once I get something into my brain I, unfortunately, get a little obsessed. So, as soon as Emma got her temporary permit, I bookmarked every online used car website in existence and searched with crazed fervor each day. I talked to my mechanic--a guy I would trust with my children--and I kept emailing back and forth with my dad about different vehicles we saw online. My cousin did autochecks for me, I found out how to read a carfax, and I knew all the important questions to ask. I was geared up and ready to go.
One day near Christmas, I went past a vehicle MY MECHANIC was selling! Within my price range, four wheel drive--fabulous! My dad, “Eeh, I’m not real impressed. It has some bumps and scratches.” The hubby, “Eeh, it’s too early. Let’s wait a bit.” It sold in two days. Door slam number one.
On the way to Onaway, I drove by a Toyota RAV4. Awesome; my mechanic loves Toyotas. I found it on Craigslist as well, and sent an email. No word. Should’ve called. By the time the hubby approved calling, it sold. Door slam number two.
While I was in a nearby town, I stopped by a used car dealer there with a list of autos I wanted to see. No, no, you don’t want to buy any of the cars in your price range; you want to buy this car. When I asked for the carfax, the dealer ‘discovered’ that the odometer has been tampered with. Well, that was shady. Door slam number three.
There was a Jeep Liberty in Cheboygan I liked… sold. Door slam number four.
I convinced my hubby to go “car shopping,” and we went to a place in Gaylord that listed a Saturn Vue. The place turned out to be a pole barn, where they also sold a Ninja Turtle Costume, a printer, a K'nex Batmobile, and a set of dishes. It was like a garage sale, which also sold cars. We asked if we could take the car for a drive and the guy just handed us the keys. Have I said shady before? This was past shady and into darkness. Door slam number five.
TO BE CONTINUED
Joining in our quest for the Millennial’s car, my father-in-law asked a dealership in Gaylord where he knew a guy. “Well, we just got in a Subaru. I’ll call you with more details,” the guy said. We drove through their lot (with the Littles in the back of the van screaming at each other) and determined that any Subaru they had would be out of our price range. When we get home, I did my daily look-up and--low and behold!--they had a Subaru wagon with 38,000 miles! Sounded like a weird story, but we were psyched. I emailed the dealer, who said they’d get back with me. The next morning, we dropped off the Littles at the in-laws’ and took the information from their website with us. Eric had a check in his back pocket; we were serious about this car. Word for word, here was our conversation:
“Hello, can I help you?”
“We’re here about the Subaru wagon?”
“Oh, we sold that! Last night, right?” (Looked behind her at co-workers for confirmation.) “Yup, last night. Can we interest you in something else?”
“Nope.” We walked out. Why wouldn’t SOMEONE have contacted us, so we didn’t drive all the way over there and waste a day? Door slam number six.
We decided, we’re in Gaylord, let’s drive around. We stopped at all the dealers and NOTHING. Then, we drove by one interesting place with lots of used cars. The OPEN sign was lit and the front light was on, but no one answered the door. There was nothing on any of the cars which told details. The website they had didn’t even list most of the vehicles sitting in the lot. So, already annoyed by the first dealership of the day, I called the number on their sign and left a pretty snotty message about how, if they’d like to sell cars, they should actually have some information available.
I got a call back from the owner within about five minutes. He sounded very nice, apologetic, and insisted the holidays and the snow got the better of him, and that he’d only been there to leave the light on because he was loaning the wrestling coach a car to drive to a meet. Okay, I feel like a jerk. Can you give me information on the RAV4?
Three days later, the Millennial herself and I drove to Gaylord in rain-snow-fog to pick up the vehicle and drive it to my blessed mechanic. As soon as I started the thing up, I felt like giving up. Every warning light on the dash lit up. I drove it to Indian River anyway, in hopes that it was one little problem making each light turn on. My mechanic told me this could be case (or, as I had said aloud when I walked in, I may have found the ONLY lemon-Toyota in all of Northern Michigan), and I left him the keys. We went out to breakfast and spent our last day of break watching a movie together, waiting for the mechanic to call.
At four, I finally gave him a call, not wanting to seem pushy. Apparently, he had called at 11:15, but left a message on my cellphone (no cell service in the house). Eric and I went to meet him, and, not only should we not buy this car, my mechanic said the guy shouldn’t even be selling it! It was a tense and slow drive back to Gaylord where the conversation between Eric and the owner went like this:
“So, are you interested in that Toyota?”
“No.”
“Did you want to look at something else?”
“No.”
“Want me to keep an eye out for anything in particular?”
“No.”
From shady to darkness to just plain unethical--door slam number seven.
We went back to school with no time to shop. The clock was ticking on her license test. We were no closer to a purchase than we were in August.
Our first snowday after we returned to school, I convinced Eric to go all the way over to Charlevoix, where there were two places we could look at cars. We took Ben and left Becca with Emma, to limit the fighting. Ben fell asleep in the car on the drive, so Eric went into the first dealership to inquire about one particular car. Yep, you guessed it: sold the day before. I really needed to learn to CALL before driving. Door slam number eight.
We went up and down the road looking for the other place I’d seen online and finally figured out it was directly across the street. As Eric went in, a guy pulled up in the VERY CAR I’d wanted to look at. I was expecting to hear that this man was purchasing the vehicle, but it was actually the owner. Could it be? A decent car? We took it for a ride and it drove great. We were hesitantly hopeful.
When we got into the dealership, our hopes slowly died. Eric asked the owner about the price being different on the window than it was on the internet. The owner replied with a creepy wink and a smile. I asked about taking the car to our mechanic and the owner said he didn’t allow other people to check out his cars, because they (the mechanics) might be dishonest in order to drive the price down for the customer. And there was an airbag light that would not turn off, which the owner did not seem to think was a big deal. As we left, we knew we wouldn’t be back, and we had wasted yet another day. Door slam number nine.
We’re thinking maybe we’ll just get her a horse.
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